The Truth About You & Me (12 page)

“What?” I asked, my mouth going dry.

“Us. This.” You glanced back at me for a moment before leaning down and grabbing another small stone, lobbing it into the river in a graceless way like you wanted to see a harsh splash. “I'm trying to ignore what I know every single other person would say, and I'm trying to just think of being with you instead.”

The air felt like it'd been sucked out of my lungs, in the same way it's sucked from a room during a house fire. “I thought we decided—”

Your look silenced me. It was somehow fierce and soft at the same time. “We did, and I won't go back on that. I want to see what this could be with us. But-—”

“But you've thought about walking away,” I said, fear settling over me, like you were going to desert me at any moment. And I was too far gone to handle that. “You've thought about what everyone else would think.”

You nodded, but your eyes were trained on the water and all I could see was your thick, dark lashes, as for a moment you closed your eyes and they brushed your cheeks. I wanted to touch them, touch you, but I stayed glued to that spot on the bank, my feet at odd angles on the rocks.

“You're so much younger than me,” you said in a matter-of-fact voice, in a way I couldn't refute. “And I don't even know if you're just doing an AA degree, or planning to transfer and move away, or what, and I just keep wondering what the hell I'm doing with a girl fresh out of high school.”

I can't explain the relief I felt at the way you'd worded that, because I knew that when I responded I wouldn't have to lie—not so obviously, anyway—because I sort of
was
fresh out of high school. I wasn't going to class there anymore, never would again.

But the “
out”
of high school didn't totally work, because, really, I was enrolled
in
high school. Formally. Technically. Legally. Just not physically, since I would never go there again unless I needed to for paperwork or something.

Me and you, we were both done with high school.

And yet I also knew, could see … that you were struggling with the idea of dating an eighteen-year-old, a fresh face.

“I don't know yet. About college,” I said. “What I want to do, where I want to go, if anywhere at all. I have time.”

If you asked my parents, they would explain the plan. They'd had it figured out for me since birth. I had the GET account, the brochures, the flawless transcript. I was going to a four-year college. I would follow in my mom's footsteps. Avoid my dad's
failed
path.

You were the first person I'd admitted the truth to. The first person to whom I said simply,
I don't know
. It was amazing how freeing those three words were, how good it felt to hear them out loud. How much I wanted to admit I had no goddamn idea what I wanted from college, from life.

I wanted you to know how lost I was, but we weren't there yet. I couldn't say those things. And for that moment,
I don't know
was enough.

I blew out a long, weighty sigh, one probably too heavy for our romantic moment. “Don't you ever just get tired of having everything mapped out, predestined, planned? I just want to
live.
Decide which way to turn once I'm sitting at the intersection, you know? Screw the road maps and flip a coin.”

You nodded, pursing your lips like you had things you wanted to say, but then your lips just curled a little and you turned to look at me again. “You really are smart.”

“Thanks,” I said. “Maybe next time you could try not to sound so surprised.”

You laughed, and the mood lifted, and then you turned away from the water and walked up to me, and you let your hands settle on my hips as you leveled a gaze at me. “It feels so weird to think I might've met my match in a girl so much younger … but it also feels so … ”

“Right?” I asked.

You nodded, your lips pressed in a thin line. “Yeah. And that's what scares me. That I feel like I could settle into this … into you … without a look back.”

“Why is that so scary?”

“Because every sane thought I have is telling me it's not right to date a student. I'm risking everything … ”

“For me,” I said, finishing your thought.

You nodded. “Yes. I'm risking everything for you. For the chance to be with you.”

“You say that like maybe I'm not worth it.”

“There's not a doubt in my mind you're worth it,” you whispered, leaning in, pulling my hips up against yours so that our bodies were touching at our stomachs, hips, thighs. It was intimate in a way I'd never experienced, casual in a way I hadn't expected. Like we fit together, were meant to be like that.

I let go of the tension in my shoulders, my arms slackening as I leaned into you, my body fitting against yours, my cheek resting against your shoulder. “I wish this was easier,” I whispered. “I wish we'd met some other way, so it wouldn't feel so … ”

“Conflicted?” you offered.

But I wasn't conflicted. I was utterly convinced we belonged together, that we'd always
be
together. And some part of me twinged inside because you'd picked that word, like you had doubts. But I didn't voice this.

“Difficult,” I said instead. “I want to be with you everywhere. On campus, at the grocery store. I want to not wonder if someone is watching us right now.”

You tried so hard to hide it, but I could feel the slightest tension ripple through you, like you hadn't considered that and the idea that someone was watching us terrified you.

You always did have more at stake. I was stupid, naïve then, and I never quite saw it, but it was always
you
with the risk. Your life, your reputation, your job.

I would always be the sweet, bookish girl who got taken advantage of. That's how the world sees me. Pity, sympathy, sadness … so many things, but no one who matters is disgusted.

Not like they are with you.

Maybe I needed to be eighteen to get that. Maybe that's where the two years come in. Perhaps they bring the ability to understand what's at stake, to foresee what could happen in a few weeks or months. Because at that moment, on that river bank, I sure didn't possess the ability to look forward and see what was coming.

I only saw you and how much I wanted you. I knew in that moment I had to make you mine, whatever the pain, whatever was in store for us.

I just wish I'd known, that day at the river, that it wasn't my own life, my own pain, at stake.

It was yours.

We stayed on
the riverbank for almost two hours, sitting on the rocks until we were both more than a little frozen. It was a different world there, on the shores of the river, where time seemed to stop around us as if that superpower of mine actually worked. But eventually we had to give in to the cold, and we traced our path back to your adorable little house. I leaned into my jacket, wishing I'd worn something a little warmer, rubbi
ng my hands together, willing them to warm, driving away the tingly feeling just as
we stepped through your back door and went to the kitchen.

I stayed quiet as I watched you work, pulling things out of the fridge, stepping out back to light the grill, turning and twisting and cooking like you did it every day, were at ease in the kitchen.

My parents thought I was going to the library, then studying with friends. I had never
ever
lied to them like this, and they had absolutely no reason to think I wasn't telling the truth. That's why it was such a piece of cake. Sixteen years of being the model child—screaming inside for some kind of relief and yet marching on like a soldier, doing every little thing expected of me—and in that instant I'd given them the first bald-faced lie, the first one of many that would lead me down to the cliff, the cliff I'd jump right off of in a few short weeks as my lies snowballed.

“It'll be done in a few,” you said by the time I'd fully warmed. “There's Snapple and soda in the fridge.”

I got up just as you stepped outside to pull the chicken off the grill, stopping to pat Voldemort as I headed toward the fridge. It's funny how different your dog was when he was home, how often he just slept on his bed, occasionally thumping his tail on the ground. So different from the dog who bounded up the trails with us.

When I peered into your fridge, I saw Snapple and soda, but I also saw beer and a six-pack of hard cider and I was
so damned tempted
to grab one, twist it open, and walk out to that patio like there was nothing wrong. I wanted to be old enough to do that so you wouldn't feel so wrong about us.

All I ever wanted was to be free with you, but every time I turned around there were more restrictions, more evidence that I wasn't as old as you were.

So I grabbed a half-lemonade/half-tea Snapple and popped the top, reading the silly little fact under the lid.
Relative to size, the tongue is the strongest muscle in the human body.

God, I did not need to be thinking of the tongue.

I had to wait to kiss you.

Later, so many people told me that your allure had to do with you being forbidden. Like somehow knowing I wasn't allowed to be with you is what made me want to be with you even more. I don't believe that.

I tossed the lid into the trash and walked outside, to where you were leaning over that grill, the mouth-watering scent of smoked cedar wood and chicken wafting toward me as I plunked down in a plastic chair, no longer worried about the cold, just zipping my jacket up to my chin. “It smells awesome,” I said, smiling.

“Thanks. I have to admit I'm a terrible cook, but I can barbecue okay.”

“I guess you need a girl for that,” I said, surprised at my quick quip. “I can cook a mean lasagna.”

Actually, I can cook pretty dang well. I mean, my dad does a decent Mr. Mom act, but I'm better. Since my mom is MIA so often, I'd picked up the slack and somehow found my own gene for cooking. It's actually one of the few things I can connect with my dad about. Those moments in the kitchen when we work together, even wordless, are sometimes the only moments we share.

I held out the platter to you as you pulled off the lid on the grill, setting it on the cracked patio. Everything about this place reminded me of a perfect old pair of sweats, or a chipped, beloved mug. Well used, broken-in, and comfortable, but not flawless. And yet to me, knowing you had your own place, knowing you could support yourself … it was awe-inspiring on its own.

Because as I stood beside you, I realized that I could support myself someday, that I didn't have to have my parents create the way, didn't need them to decide which path I'd take and then pave it in gold for me.

What if I didn't want to go to MIT or Harvard? What if I finished my two-year degree and got an office job and hung around town … for you, for me, for us? What if we created our own life and it had nothing to do with them, had nothing to do with my mom and dad's plans for me?

Every second I spent with you was like liberation, was like a way for me to poke holes in their plans, in their requirements, in their expectations. It was only in those moments away from their keen eyes that I felt like I could breathe deeply and figure out who I wanted to be.

I know that if they read this, that means they're going to blame you, act like you're the reason I questioned their college pathway. The thing is, it's not just you. Maybe you pointed me in a new direction, but I chose to open my eyes, I chose to blink and look around.

And as you put that barbecue chicken on the platter, I felt a strange mix of grown-up and relaxed, like maybe the intensity I felt in my life wasn't because of me at all, but them.

And maybe with you I could have something different, could
be someone
different.

A girl who took charge of her life.

I took the platter inside and you followed, after tossing the lid back on the grill and closing the vents to snuff out the remaining charcoal.

I slid the sliding glass door closed behind me, shivering again. I'd planned to dress cuter but that would have required freezing my ass off, so I'd settled somewhere in the middle.

We each picked a piece of chicken and a scoop of macaroni salad and then you led me to the living room. “That window by the table is kind of drafty, so why don't we eat in here,” you said, setting your plate on the coffee table. You reached behind us and pulled forward a rainbow-colored blanket. “My mom totally quilted this, so you cannot make fun of it,” you said, grinning like you fully expected me to make fun of it.

“Knitted,” I said instead.

“Huh?” you asked.

“‘Quilted' is like making a patchwork quilt. She
knitted
it.”

“Oh.” You chuckled. “Okay, so she knitted this psychotic thing. My request still stands.”

“Deal.”